Document Type
Student Note
Abstract
In situations where a child has been killed or injured as the result of a third party's negligent, tortious act, case law overwhelmingly supports the view that a parent may not recover damages from the third-party tortfeasor for the loss of the child's society and companionship. A growing minority of cases, however, have expreessly recognized that such losses are recoverable, and other cases have employed language susceptible to the interpretation that recovery for such losses may be allowed. While most of this development has been in the area of wrongful death, rather than personal injury, the analysis for one area is without distinction from the analysis for the other.' Consideration will be given to the cases in which this issue has been raised, and to the justifications that courts have used to arrive at their decisions to exclude or include such loss as an element of damages.
Recommended Citation
Michael B. Victorson,
Torts--Parent's Recovery for Loss of Society and Companionship of Child,
80
W. Va. L. Rev.
(1978).
Available at:
https://researchrepository.wvu.edu/wvlr/vol80/iss2/12